


Chronicles of a love

by Slaveya



Category: Da Vinci's Demons
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-29
Updated: 2016-07-29
Packaged: 2018-07-27 12:38:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7618411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slaveya/pseuds/Slaveya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What are Leo and Lucrezia? Friends, lovers, family or enemies</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chronicles of a love

**Author's Note:**

> * Leonardo calls Lucrezia "L". It is a joke between them.  
> * Catherine, Andrea and Amelia are Leo and Lucrezia's children.

Prologue 

Florence, 1500  
The sunset was a painter, the sky -its canvas. Light- blue was absorbed by tender-pink clouds. The last sunbeams inflamed the pink chant and in a moment turned it into an orange-red explosion. The sun circle melted into the gaudy in color fire that could be put out only by the dark palette of the coming dusk.  
Leonardo passed by his new studio. Well, “new” was a word which someone would use around three decades ago. Now it was a rather run-down place which constant inhabitants were only rats, bats and cockroaches. The market nearby was still there. The smell of spoilt fish and fruit welcomed him. Merchants or actually their wives huddled with customers so their high-pitched voices mixed with chuckle of molting hens in their hands. The Duomo was a bit greyer than Leo remembered it. The dome was covered with the grey-blue cloak of the dusk while shadows of trees, passers-by or vehicles were showing a pantomime on its walls.  
Da Vinci turned left on a small street behind the cathedral. When he was a lad, this neighborhood didn’t exist. He curiously looked at the buildings around and couldn’t admit that Florence managed to surprise him again. The white house was hidden between two new-built residences of Medicis. It was rather simple. The carved wreath of spring flowers on the front door had disappeared under a dozen layers of dust. Before Leo knocked, a housemaid opened. The note about his coming had obviously arrived on time. The servant-girl, dressed utterly in white, silently invited him in and pointed the ladder before vanishing in the kitchen. The maestro climbed up as every star squeaked under his steps.  
The room was as he remembered it. A spacious room with bright -red curtains, stylish furniture and paintings on the walls. He knew the painter or used to know him once thirty years ago. An ambitious full of ideas (most of which could be defined only with the word “reckless”) and energy young man called Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci.  
\- The wine is on the table, the notebook, pencils and all other art things are in the cupboard  
The woman was sitting in an armchair near the window so her gaze was dancing on the deserted street.  
\- Hi, …  
Once he could call her Lucrezia, then L but now neither of this seemed appropriate.  
\- Bona sera, senior Da Vinci.  
Her words were such as whisper that he wasn’t sure whether he heard them or his imagination mocked at him.  
\- You paint a portrait of me or not?  
Leo opened the cupboard and an avalanche of sketches, brushes and faded notebooks fell on the ground. He found what needed and tried to put the left back in the cupboard. But he couldn’t.  
\- The housemaid will do it – Lucrezia irritably said.  
Leo got some brushes, three tubules with paint and a palette.  
Lucrezia stood up, lighted all six candles in the candlestick and sat on the another armchair in the room. Leo turned the chair where she used to be and sat opposite her.  
His pencil began to dance on the paper. It was a bridge between the past and the present. The grey graphite drew an oval face, with some soft-brown tresses on the forehead, two elegant thin eyebrows, sparkling eyes, rosy lips…  
\- Don’t you talk with your models, maestro?  
Leo looked at her and unconsciously smashed the drawing in his hand. The light-blue eyes that enchanted him once many years ago were almost grey and dull. A spider web of wrinkles had covered the tender skin. The fresh lips he had kissed so many times had turned into a thin curve. Her hands, laid in her lap, had constant tremors.  
Lucrezia continued as if she hadn’t noticed his shock.  
\- Botticelli always has a small chatter with his models. Do you know what he usually asks them?  
Of course Leonardo knew. Everyone who had stopped at Florence at least for a day knew it. Sandro smiled politely and the words came out of his mouth so calmly as if he asked the most trivial question. “Are you in love, senora?”  
\- What would you answer him? - Leo was looking nervously at her. A storm of a scandal was about to happen but actually with such a topic it was inevitable.  
\- Yeah I used to. I fell in love with a genius – the word slipped from her mouth like a poison- a genius that claimed to love me … to be with me … an honest man with great projects and … three bastards … a loving father of three children … that he hasn’t seen for a decade …  
\- I write you every day. I send you money  
Leo’s words caused only a new outburst.  
\- Letters – Lucrezia burst into laughter – my children don’t need them … they need a father not a letter-writer …  
Leonardo had realized that love between them had vanished long time ago but this hatred stabbed him in the heart.  
\- L,  
\- L is dead. – Lucrezia cut in harshly. – L died with Amelia.  
\- L, we  
\- ” We” doesn’t exist… You should have left me there in that church… - tears were falling on her cheeks. – dying… You and Sofia shouldn’t have saved me.  
Lucrezia was broken down. She never mentioned anything of this in her letters to Leo. Disappointment, loneliness, difficulties, Amelia’s death had ruined her.  
*** The story between Leonardo and Lucrezia can’t be found in any history book or a novel about Leonardo Da Vinci. But once it was the most scandalous rumor in Florence. It should be told. It is not just a story of glamour. It is a tale of friendship, happiness, pain, misfortunes, hatred and love.


End file.
